Don’t Starve Together Pokémon Edition?

[Mike23Ua]

Okay so many decades ago I played the original Pokémon games (red, blue, green & yellow on Gameboy) And also PTTCG (Pokémon the Trading Card Game.)

Pokemon always had strengths and weaknesses- for example a Fire type Pokémon was weak against a Water type Pokémon but strong against a Grass Type.

Many games have used this strength/weakness formula outside of just Pokémon but.. Pokémon is the one I’m MOST familiar with so I’m using it as the basis of my thread.

What does Pokémon have to do with DST you ask? Well ALOT.. but at the same time- Not much at all if this is starting to confuse you I will just skip to the TL:DR-

Wendys Weaknesses are: Fighting shadow creatures, Abigail will not attack these at all and therefore Wendy’s petal damage buff she gets from Abigail never goes into play so Wendy’s lower damage when not using Abbys buff is in full play here.

But Wendy’s Strengths are fighting any large group of mobs- thanks to Abigails shield that prevents her from taking to much rapid damage from multiple sources.

Now Willows Strength is fighting fire mobs and shadow creatures due to her immunity to fire damage and Bernie being literally designed to fight shadows.

Currently Wendy is the ONLY character in the game with this Strength/Weakness style Pokémon gameplay..

But what I Don’t understand is WHY?? Why if Wurt gains sanity from holding pet fish… does she NOT lose sanity when having to fight fish type mobs (like Being forced to kill RockJaw sharks for example… those are still fish and Wurts Sanity should be taking a nose dive having to have to kill her fishy friends..)

Similar to how plucking flowers or chopping trees anywhere near a wormwood tanks his Sanity.

If each character had a group of mobs in the game they were good at fighting & another group they had a harder time fighting we would effectively have DST: Pokémon Edition.

not only does something like this help to make each character feel further unique from one another, but it also gives characters like Wolfgang who’s compendium description clearly states he has quote “A Myriad of Phobias”  it gives someone like HIM Mobs that he can’t just punch his way through with brute force.

When it comes to WX78 and Wolfgang in particular they’re both insanely over-powered but they BOTH should have some strong weaknesses too..

WX78 being a robot I would assume things like water type mobs would deal more damage to them for example.

In the shortest answer possible: it gives every character things they are best at doing/fighting.. and things they’re worst at doing/fighting.

 

[Third Porkus]

7 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

 

 

But also it's not like pokemon because it's nothing like pokemon

[Mike23Ua]

5 minutes ago, Third Porkus said:

But also it's not like pokemon because it's nothing like pokemon

That’s not the point of this thread- I made this thread so we can discuss what we feel each and every single characters Strengths & Weaknesses should be mostly:

What they excel best at or do the worst job at doing or Which mobs they should be best & worst at fighting.

I would prefer it if people who main these characters would provide what They feel their favorite characters strengths and weaknesses should be.. but anyone can contribute really.

And please don’t say something ridiculous like Wolfgang’s weakness should be giant potato, that’s why he is seen carrying it off screen in RWYS.. he’s throwing it away into the ocean.

while funny.. that’s not what I’m looking for- I’m looking for something more along the lines of how Wendy already plays: Shes best at fighting large groups of mobs, but worst at fighting shadows because Abigail won’t help her.

Willow gets colder than any other character faster, so her weaknesses would obviously be any mobs dealing with water or Ice where her strengths are Shadows & Fire mobs.

Wormwood is a plant and therefore should be weaker to the above mentioned fire mobs, but maybe his strengths would be being able to be friends with normally hostile plant mobs (which sadly there’s few in the game right now.. but being able to not be attacked by Seaweeds or Lureplants still count non-theless)

[Baark0]

isnt willow affected more by the cold? also wendy's weakness is negated by beefalo

[SonicDen220]

The only pokemon type matchup I can recall in DST is "electricity > water"

[minespatch]

2 hours ago, SonicDen220 said:

The only pokemon type matchup I can recall in DST is "electricity > water"

[minespatch]

I like this part of Pocket Starve:

[QuartzBeam]

Slow day, huh?

[HowlVoid]

I deleted my comment I dont need another warning. Ahem.

Pokemon, huh?

I guess Wormwood would be a grass/dark type?

Dark is super effective against ghost so all Wendy players should automatically submit to me. Also everyone else is the flesh typing so I I'm also super effective on them via my paper cut special ability. 

Ok so what do I win?

[ArubaroBeefalo]

We have enough pokemon stuff with BQ and toadstool

[Mike23Ua]

I think you guys maybe missed the point, If WX78 for example had a mob it struggled to fight, Then WX78 eating all the gears in the Map couldn’t just be the instant win answer to everything.

WX78 & Wolfgang in Particular are Ridiculously Over-Powered, And as much as people like to scream Wendy OP please Nerf: At least Wendy actually does HAVE a Weakness.. And that Weakness will continue to come into play with each new Shadow mob Klei adds to the game.

As long As Abigail refuses to help to provide the damage buff: There will be Weakness for Wendy.

With Wolfgang or WX78 (Two characters that have yet to be reworked..) currently their only Weakness is not finding enough food to eat.. But if these Raw powerhouse characters had a Mob that even at their Max Strength they still were Worst at fighting by themselves there would be more balance between character choices.

As an example let’s pretend Wolfgang had a phobia to Spiders, and while fighting spiders he was weaker, which would make Wendy and Abigail in “Blender Mode” actually useful to that Wolfgang.

Even Injustice 2 Mobile uses this sort of Pokémon style set up well to be more precise it’s more of a “Rock, Paper, Scissors” set up.

As another Example if Hamlet style Iron Hulk parts were added to the game: Maybe WX78 could be strongest against fighting them due to their electrical attacks Over-Charging WX78 powering them up.

The Pokemon related jokes are funny- But they aren’t what the thread is about, And I guess maybe playing Injustice 2 Mobile would better explain this Strength/Weakness system 

Certain characters would be stronger fighting X, but Weakest fighting Y.

Its honestly not that hard of a concept- As long as those mobs are STILL fightable in solo play (albeit a slight bit harder) this kind of Rock, Paper, Scissors style Strength/Weakness system could exist.

And more importantly it would better help to further flesh out the characters in the game, their play styles and their character personalities.

[AlternateMew]

I think people saw the word Pokemon and just ignored the rest lol

Forget about Pokemon types, folks. I believe the idea here is characters having things they handle better or worse due to personality and physical traits. Wurt no want hurt fish. Wolfgang afraid of lots of things. Webber cry when spiders die. 

I think we already have this though. I mean more would be cool don't get me wrong. Wolfgang could use a heavy rework to make his gameplay match his personality. Right now he's the polar opposite; you WANT the scaredy-cat to fight the big scary monsters.

But Willow is heat resistant, Wurt is waterproof, Wormwood burns and hates seeing trees murdered, WX takes damage in rain, Wendy is less afraid of the dark. It's there. Small things, but they're there.

[Mantispidae]

Walter is allergic to bee-type pokemon but everyone thought that was lame

[Mike23Ua]

3 hours ago, AlternateMew said:

I think people saw the word Pokemon and just ignored the rest lol

Forget about Pokemon types, folks. I believe the idea here is characters having things they handle better or worse due to personality and physical traits. Wurt no want hurt fish. Wolfgang afraid of lots of things. Webber cry when spiders die. 

I think we already have this though. I mean more would be cool don't get me wrong. Wolfgang could use a heavy rework to make his gameplay match his personality. Right now he's the polar opposite; you WANT the scaredy-cat to fight the big scary monsters.

But Willow is heat resistant, Wurt is waterproof, Wormwood burns and hates seeing trees murdered, WX takes damage in rain, Wendy is less afraid of the dark. It's there. Small things, but they're there.

Yes this: if Wurt loves fish, she should take a Sanity hit having to kill fishtype mobs. If Klei adds new types of shadow creatures: Abigail won’t help Wendy fight them.

I don’t play Wormwood much but if he had to kill Treeguards it would take a blow to his Sanity.

An idea like this would help give each character mobs they are best & worst at fighting.

[Mantispidae]

The key issue with this kind of balancing is that it creates an unstable difficulty based entirely on what mobs end up qualifying, because depending on how you slice it you can craft a huge wall based solely on what mobs characters are going to end up fighting more.

So like, lets look at Wurt. She thinks of fish as cute pets and as a result gains sanity when she has one. This is not a downside-free perk at all btw, dead fish do lower sanity more than live ones restore it- so there is punishment for letting the pet die. So what about fish mobs? Well you have like the rockjaw, and if you were being generous the merms. Losing sanity or being weaker fighting rockjaws specifically when they are a hostile mob sticks out as just a weird choice, especially since holding the loot (fish meat) will already provide sanity drop. As for the merms she clearly doesn't give much a damn if the King dies, but I still don't see much added by any form of penalty for merm attacking or death.

And if the merm followers were to cause sanity drop, then it would stand to reason that Webber, who's at characterized as a well-meaning kid who probably likes his spiders a lot should have penalties, and can you IMAGINE how painfully obnoxious that would be if he took a sanity hit for spider deaths? Spiders being literally the most common mob in game, an a mob he needs to collect 10-20 of to effectively fight things depending on which ones you can get? When he already has 100 sanity? You'd be fighting shadow monsters more than playing the game, especially as a newcomer when you can really only effectively collect the warriors and default spiders, and likely be driven away from amassing spiders when thats supposed to be the fun upside of webber (and the downside being that spiders largely suck at combat until you figure out the tricks).

If you make these selections based on lore reasons you kinda have to account for the fact that it would apply to multiple things and would need to be considered when adding in new mobs or if it largely just causes needless difficulty with parts of the game. Many of which are already considered in external ways. Willow doesn't like cold but likes fire- does she need some sort of special mechanic for specifically for deerclops and dragonfly? No, because her main perk already works fine for that by adjusting her temperature control. What would characters like Wilson, Wigfrid, Maxwell, etc have issues fighting? If the answers none, you just made things more complicated for a handful of characters and not everyone, and the selection needs to be obvious enough that it can be reasoned when and where characters would experience without it feeling like a completely random event. I was joking about Walter earlier, but his character traits at least explicitly clarify bees, of which all offending mobs are clearly labeled (Grumblebee, bee,killer bee, bee queen) and bee allergies are pretty well known. It's also pretty obvious that a bee allergy would make the bees more threatening to be hit by, but not affect how easily you can actually fight them. If walter was suddenly losing sanity per time he attacked a bee or dealt less damage to bees it would just feel dumb.

Most of the balance lies in how the mechanics of the game treat the characters and how their perks and downsides influence them. This means that some characters will already have variable experiences with certain mobs, and some won't. Most of these variables won't be with the mobs themselves but in the details (Like Wurt not being able to easily carry fish-related loot because she loses sanity from it). Trying to make it an across the board thing just doesn't work for everyone and depending on how far you stretch it could make some characters simply less fun to play due to inconveniences with the mob selection. Wormwood loses sanity from picking flowers, could you image if he lost sanity for picking farm crops? You could justify it, but god, it wouldn't be the slightest bit meaningful.

 

[Wardin25]

Wolfgang's Intimidation caused the clouds to cry

It started to rain!

Wolfgang used Spicy Voltgoat Jelly!

Toadstool used Scream!

It did nothing!

Wolfgang used Dark Sword!

Toadstool fainted

im kidding, its frikin dead

[Mike23Ua]

I don’t think Webber’s spiders dying would count (if you want to read some disturbing stuff go google how the Black Widow spider actually gets it’s name..)

The TL:DR version of that is Spiders fight & kill one another territorial, and for food.

Webber losing sanity anytime he picks up and “Murders” a spider isn’t exactly what I had in mind.

Giving each character a particular group of mobs they are best at fighting & worst at fighting however is.

For Example: Maybe Wormwood doesn’t lose sanity from picking crops because the veggies aren’t the plant.. they’re just food provided by the plant.. BUT Would lose sanity if he had to fight the walking Venus fly trap like walking plants from Hamlet.

[TheFat]

13 hours ago, Mike23Ua said:

WX78 & Wolfgang in Particular are Ridiculously Over-Powered,

Pray tell, how is WX78 considered OP? He is just tankier when maxed out, and move faster when charged, he cannot deal massive dmg like Wolfgang or deal AoE dmg like Wendy. If anything, he is less of a "OP" character but a "comfy" character. 

[GenomeSquirrel]

6 hours ago, Mike23Ua said:

I don’t think Webber’s spiders dying would count (if you want to read some disturbing stuff go google how the Black Widow spider actually gets it’s name..)

That's actually more complicated that you think

https://www.kqed.org/science/1917913/why-the-male-black-widow-spider-is-a-real-home-wrecker

6 hours ago, Mike23Ua said:

For Example: Maybe Wormwood doesn’t lose sanity from picking crops because the veggies aren’t the plant.. they’re just food provided by the plant.. BUT Would lose sanity if he had to fight the walking Venus fly trap like walking plants from Hamlet.

Interestingly, fruits actually want to be eaten, it's the plants way of getting you to spread its seeds

Generally doesn't make sense for vegetables, except using in game logic and assuming Wormwood is nurturing them well enough to maximize seeds.

[2021gingerm]

Love it.